The San Antonio Spurs are one of the greatest dynasties of all time, winning five championships during the Tim Duncan era. The trio of Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, and Manu Ginobili won four out of five of those championships together, and they are clearly one of the winningest trios of all time.
A recent statistic that illustrated just how successful they were together was posted by Kirk Goldsberry. He revealed that out of the 141 players that have played at least 100 games, only 3 of them won more than 70% of their games, and those 3 players are the Spurs trio.
141 NBA Players have played at least 1,000 games.
Only 3 of them have won more than 70% of the time:
Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, and Manu Ginobili. pic.twitter.com/SWhw8rYOuu
— Kirk Goldsberry (@kirkgoldsberry) August 11, 2022
This is an absolutely insane achievement, and the San Antonio Spurs have played a beautiful brand of basketball under Gregg Popovich. However, the biggest piece of the dynasty was obviously, superstar Tim Duncan. He is widely viewed as the greatest power forward of all time, and he was elite on both ends of the floor. In fact, Gregg Popovich once admitted that without Tim Duncan, the Spurs would have no championships.
On a professional level, the most concise way to put it, no Duncan, no championships.
He led by example… it’s just how he rolls. With his teammates, he set the quiet example of competing every day, whether it was practice, or shootaround… he always took the lead, and even Manu and Tony looked towards him. He gave them himself in a very humble and quiet way.
Hopefully, we see people give Tim Duncan his respect in the future. He is viewed as a top-5 player of all time due to his two-way prowess, and he was equally as good at scoring as he was at protecting the rim.
The San Antonio Spurs are currently rebuilding, notably trading away All-Star Dejounte Murray to the Atlanta Hawks. Hopefully, they are able to draft another top-tier prospect in the near future and add more championships to their trophy cabinet.
